News, Analysis and Perspective for Solution Providers and Technology Integrators

‘In January, there will be no more support for Windows 7. This is the biggest opportunity for partners in five years since the Windows XP migration,’ said Laura Reddick, Microsoft client programs manager for Dell EMC, at XChange 2019.

Dell EMC is pushing partners to refresh their customers’ client devices through the Windows 7 to Windows 10 migration, which will need to be done by January when Microsoft will end support for Windows 7.

“In January, there will be no more support for Windows 7. This is the biggest opportunity for partners in five years since the Windows XP migration,” said Laura Reddick, Microsoft client programs manager at Dell EMC, during a session at XChange 2019. “This is the biggest client refresh opportunity out there.”

Reddick said there’s a $100 billion opportunity for channel services and solutions globally for Windows 7 to Windows 10 migration, including 46 million SMB customers in the U.S. alone who need to make the transition. She said 50 percent of SMBs are not aware that Microsoft’s ending of support for Windows 7—which includes the end of security updates and online technical content updates—is a mere 10 months away.

“This is your biggest opportunity for your SMB customers because they are more vulnerable to hacking, etc., which could cost them $80,000 per incident,” said Reddick. “So why should they switch? Security.”

John Hardwick, president of nXio, a Lenexa, Kan.-based solution provider, said there are customers who still view Windows 7 as “new” but that nXio has already migrated many of its SMB customers to Window 10.

“There’s an opportunity for the channel here and there’s going to be value,” said Hardwick. “Customers don’t seem to know that Microsoft 7 is stopping all support. Microsoft made a big deal with Windows XP end of life, but they haven’t published really the Windows 7 end of life.”

Hardwick said a hardware refresh through a Windows 10 migration might be a hard sell, but security is definitely a sticking point for customers. “I can say, ‘Look, your overall security spend is going to drop as you move toward a modern operating system. Also you’re not going to get security updates anymore from Windows 7.’ Those are going to be an easier points to drive migration,” he said.

Reddick said 80 percent of business leaders in the next two years plan to enhance their modern device portfolio, which is a great reason to start to drive device refreshes around Dell EMC’s client portfolio such as its Latitude and XPS family of devices.

In addition, Dell EMC is providing partners with a Dell Migration Tool specifically for Windows 10 migration. “You can go into your customer and plug in a few simple numbers like how many desktops, how many notebooks, what operating systems, etc. that your customer has, then at the end, this migration tool spits out a really nice professional report that shows that you can save ‘X’ amount of money by migrating,” she said. “It should help your case in helping your customers migrate.”

Partners also can build the migration case for customers around simplified integration, better productivity and lower repair and maintenance costs. Reddick said migrating to a modern device with Windows 10 drops the total maintenance costs by an average of $515 per PC. In addition, a new PC with Windows 10 and eighth-gen Intel Core processors has up to 2.1 times faster multitasking and up to 80 percent better performance compared with Windows 10 running on a four-year-old laptop.

“It’s about stronger security, better productivity, simplified integration and lower repair cost. These are the reasons to tell your SMB customers to refresh to a modern device,” said Reddick.